THe Tumut and Adelong Times 31 Jul 1928
LINK WITH EARLY DAYS. PASSING OF MR. DENIS M'NAMARA Another link with the days of early settlement in the Riverina was severed last week in the death of Mr. Denis McNamara, who came to the Murrumbidgee back in 1839. His death occurred at the residence of his niece, Mrs. Thomas Wilson, of "Greydawn," Broad-street, Wagga, at the great age of 89 years. The deceased, who was born at Campbelltown, N.S.W., in 1839, was a son of the late Mr. and Mrs. Denis McNamara, of McNamara's Creek, on the Sydney road, near Tarcutta, they being the very earliest settlers in that part, and the creek derived its name from them. "Denny" was christened in Tumut, after travelling up from Campbelltown with his parents in a bullock dray. He had no opportunity of gaining any schooling during his boyhood, as his parents were then travelling from station to station on shearing and station work. His first start in life was very hard, in company with his father; and, when only ten years of age, he travelled barefooted from Kyeamba, Station to Sydney and back delivering sheep for the Sydney market. In 1852 the great flood washed out Gundagai, where his family were hemmed in by flood waters for nearly a week without food. The family were next in Tarcutta with the late T. H. Mate. In 1860 they unsuccessfully tried their luck at ''Lambing Flat" (Young) gold rush, but later that year returned to stock droving. At ''Yanga Lake,'' Balranald, then a noted cattle station, his first job was to deliver 9000 cattle in three mobs, from the Clarence and Richmond Rivers. Later he brought through 3000 poddies from Twofold Bay via Monaro and Gundagai to "Yanga Lakes." In 1865 he went to Queensland and thence to Gulf of Carpentaria with two mates dealing in cattle. The next move in his adventurous life was with Mr. George Phillips, Government Surveyor, to survey Bourke, then to the Nicholson, Albert, Barkley, Gregory and Leichardt Rivers, and then on to the Cloncurry copper mines. Moving down Flinders River to Norman River, they surveyed the town of Normanton, where Denny-st. is named after him, and there is also a McNamara-street in Bourke. He was one of the pioneers of the Gulf country and performed great work in the initial surveys of some of the wildest country in Australia, and could recall many brushes with the blacks and the bushranging gangs. He was a bachelor, and his three brothers and two sisters all predeceased him, viz, John, late of Fitzmaurice-street, Wagga; James, who met his death at the hands of the treacherous blacks on his way to New Guinea; William, who died at Charters Towers, Queensland ; and the late Mrs. John Cheney, snr., of Oberne; and the late Mrs. Robert Cheney, snr., of Crampton-street, Wagga, and formerly of Humula. Mr. John Cheney, jnr., of Oberne and Thompson-st., Wagga, Mr. Christopher Chehey, of Humula Creek, Humula, James Cheney, of Ganmam, George Cheney, of Lane Cove, Sydney, Denis Cheney, of Peter-st., Wagga, Robert Cheney, of Yarragundry, and Alfred Cheney, of Allonby, are nephews of deceased; and Mrs. R. Nichols, of Melbourne, Mrs. Joseph Adams, of Syd ney, Mrs. James Cheney, of Ganmain, Mrs. Thomas Wilson, of Broad-st., Wagga, Mrs. William Carroll, of Crampton-st., Wagga, Mrs. Ben Shoemark, of Inverary, Tarcutta, and Mrs. Harry Kendall, of Johnston-st., Wagga, nieces. The deceased was a man of great open-heartedness, and many a person received a helping hand on in life through him. |